January 6, 2025 • 36 mins
In this episode of Youth Inc., Greg Olsen sits down with 3x NASCAR CUP Series Champion Joey Logano to explore what it takes to build a resilient athlete. Joey shares stories from his early days behind the wheel, insights into handling pressure at the highest level, and how the world of motorsport has evolved throughout his career. Whether you’re a fan of racing or looking for inspiration on achieving excellence under pressure, this episode delivers lessons that apply on and off the track.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hey, what's going on everybody? Greg Olson here and we're back
for another special interview here on Youth Inc.
Last month, I had the pleasure of sitting down with three time
NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano.
We talked about Joey's upbringing in the world of
motorsport, how he has developedas a driver throughout his
career and what advice he would give parents raising young
athletes today. This is a must listen episode,
(00:20):
so sit back, relax and we'll catch you next time right here
on You Think Joey Logano free time NASCAR Cup Series champ.
Thank you so much man, for for you to take a couple minutes and
talk to us about your journey kind of how you view sports.
We were talking a little before we started on just a little bit
of your background. We're going to dive into here in
a second, but appreciate you welcoming us to this incredible
(00:42):
museum garage, whatever you wantto call it.
Garage. Yeah.
Juliano. Appreciate you man.
Thanks for being with us here onYou Think.
Thank you. Looking forward to having a good
conversation. And yeah, this is a shop, so
it's kind of a fun place to hangout and stores.
And yeah, it's culture. I would venture it's the only,
maybe the only place in the world where there's a model TA
(01:04):
Daytona 500 and a Cheese it trophy all in the same room.
So it we're checking a lot of box.
It sounds about right to me though.
I mean if. Anyone else right there?
We're going to find that guy. And find out who he is.
But no. So one of the best things we
love about you think and kind ofdiving into the youth sports
experience and the journey. What's very unique here in
(01:24):
America, an ever changing landscape.
Take us back to your journey growing up in Connecticut,
right? Born in Connecticut, then you
went to Georgia to kind of further your racing career.
And just I got to say, I have a young kid growing up back then.
Like how do you venture into theworld of racing?
Like just give us you're not going to the local Little League
and picking up a baseball bat. Like what does that look like?
(01:46):
Well, that's the, the challenging thing about
Motorsports is because it's hard, like you said, you can't
just go to your local sporting goods store and buy a race car
like, and, and it's very complexon top of that, what kind of car
should I get? Well, and then how much air do I
put in the tires? What gear do I put in the car?
Like literally you have no clue,right?
And even with my son now, he rana couple of races.
(02:09):
I showed up to the racetrack andI don't know what to do with the
car. I don't race little cars like I
got to kind of, and I even know what to do.
So I got to kind of relearn, butthat's the most challenging
thing for, for young racers or kids that want to race is, and
it's a, it's a sport where your parents have to be involved with
you to help support you and, andtake you to the track,
(02:30):
obviously, but also the financial impacts big.
So for me, I just got a yard cart for Christmas.
That's what I got. Santa Claus brought one year and
I was like 6 loved it, right. Like my dad was more of an
athlete that can you know, he played baseball and and
basketball through high school. Like I didn't get that gene, you
know, like, and and he was in the cars and he had a trucking
(02:52):
company. And so I was naturally just
around that loved driving my go Kart every day.
When I got home, they realized that we started racing.
Car is called quarter midgets, which is kind of like a go Kart
but it's got a rolled cage and seatbelts.
So how old are you at this time when you're actually in the?
Seven, you know, it's got to be a year later.
Yeah. You're first grade start as a
kid, first. Second grade.
(03:13):
Yep. And then so that was up in
Connecticut, Raced those for a while.
And then my father sold his company and Connecticut just
wanted to move South. And so we moved to Georgia for a
while, started racing cars, Bandoleros, Legends, cars, kind
of little bigger cars getting bigger.
And at that point I was very, very fortunate because my father
(03:35):
sold his company and he committed the next 8-9 years to
just go and racing with his son.And there's not many people have
the ability to do that. But it was something very
special for for me and moments Iwill cherish forever.
But it also progressed my careerso fast, faster than I think any
(03:56):
of us are ready for and faster than anyone has in the past.
Like I was breaking barriers coming up as a kid to the point
to where like I was always waiting on my birthday to drive
the next car out. And there's a few times we may
have fudge the birth certificateto race a little bit sooner.
Secret safe with us. It lasted for a while.
No one's going to watch this. It didn't last that long, but it
(04:17):
lasted for a few races and it was fun.
But that was kind of like we were always pushing the barrier
on on. I'm just moving up as quick as
possible because as soon as I started winning in something, my
parents theory was, well, you'reonly as good as the people
you're racing against. So if you can beat them, you
better move up. And so it happened quick for me.
Now all the things I did is verynormal, like the pace of how
(04:39):
kids. You were doing it your peers of
your age all across the country or just where you were living,
like across the country. It's pretty universal.
So is it So take me like depending on where you live, is
there like a geographic component to like what the
experience is like racing and all that?
Like if you live in the Northeast versus here and
(05:00):
obviously North Carolina, probably more opportunity, like
what does that look like around the country for young kids?
Yeah. So up up north, the quarter
midgets were really big at the time and they still are, you
know, and then like the Midwest is more like dirt where they run
like midgets and Sprint cars andthose type of things.
And even that out West was like that.
And then here in the Southeast, I mean, there is a variety of
(05:23):
cars to drive and a lot of it depends on like, what do you
want to do? Like if you're a kid that just
wants to go racing, like, OK, well, there's, there's some,
some racing that's the most costeffective.
And my recommendation is when your kids young, it doesn't
really matter like what they're driving, as long as they're
behind the wheel, they're learning the the basics, right?
(05:43):
But then you got to decide, OK, do I want to go open wheel
racing? Do I want to drive Indy cars and
F1 cars? Like what's the dream?
Or do you want to, you know, do you like racing dirt and the
dream is to be a Sprint car driver or is it to go to the
NASCAR route? And any of those can be
interchangeable, but you kind ofwant to race of the type of cars
that you're going to be racing if you make it.
(06:05):
So that's kind of what we ended up doing.
My dream was to be a NASCAR driver.
And so we stayed short track. Asphalt, big heavy cars.
That's what a NASCAR race car is.
So you said something super interesting because I think a
lot of families across all different sports, team sports,
individual sports, whatever stick and ball is that balance
between when your kid is young, even if they're good.
(06:26):
There's this balance out there right now of saying some
families chase it to the ends ofthe earth.
They're on travel teams. It's 12 months a year.
We're flying to California and Arizona and Florida.
We're seeking out the biggest tournaments.
We're 8910 years old and we're playing national travel,
baseball, basketball, volleyball, whatever it is.
And then there's other families that say we don't need that,
right? Just get the ball, get the bat
(06:46):
in your hand, go down to the local Little League and just be
an 810 year old and play baseball and it'll all even out
at the end. So now you put yourself in your
shoes, you're fortunate your dad's able to make this time
investment. You're able to go kind of
continue to chase this each mark.
At what point did you guys continue to chase this and say,
we're going to shoot for the moon and then also take a step
(07:07):
back and say, I'm seven, I'm 10?Or did you guys not think that
way? Like, I think that's the the
struggle a lot of families are trying to figure out.
Like when is too much too much? But here you are sitting here,
the best driver in the world. Are you here if you didn't push
it that much when you were young?
To answer your question, I thinkthe answer is I would have been.
(07:27):
I think I would have been here either way.
OK, it might have the, the time of when I got here would have
been different and who I am today would be different as
well. But I think if you win the right
races in front of the right people and, and, and the
opportunities there, it's one thing.
But for me it was, it's a littledifferent because when I first
started, you know, getting more recognized, it's back in 2000
(07:50):
and five, 2006 and there is driver development programs
because finance is one of the hardest things with Motorsports.
Yeah, give people, give people an idea of like what that looks
like. So I mean, if you're racing like
say you're racing legends cars, right?
And then you can do that pretty much anywhere around the
country. You know you got 1520 grand in a
race car and you got to get a trailer to pull.
(08:12):
How old are you doing this? You're, you're anywhere between
9:00 to 15, like anywhere in there.
You're young, right? And then you got to get tires,
you got to get tools, you got toget a trailer, you got to get a
truck to pull the trailer you got, and then you got to bring
it to the racetrack. Then you're going to wreck it.
Then you got to fix it. And you know, like all of a
sudden you're in this. You're in a way over 100 grand.
You think it's about what? It's about 100 grand a year, or
(08:32):
I mean a. 100 grand. How many times you're going to
race? I don't know.
Yeah, right. Like.
So what relatives? What do you want to do and and
what level do you want to do it?Do you want your cars to be
nice? Do you want to win?
You got to have nice cars, right?
Like you can't just like the carmatters.
The car is half of the of the battle, right?
So that's where it gets kind of tricky.
(08:53):
And so there's lessons learned for the kids working on the car,
building the car, understanding how cars work.
Like there's all those are very,very valuable lessons because
when you do make it, you still have to know all that stuff to
help your engineers today. But for going back for me, I got
signed up at Joe Gibbs Racing when I was 15 years old.
(09:14):
And at that point, we never put another nickel into my career.
I got started, I got paid when Iwas 15 to drive race cars.
That doesn't happen today at all.
Like to this point, like until you get to Cup, people are
paying to drive cars all the waythrough.
So to make it, you got to have millions and millions of dollars
behind you to, to get you going.So it's a lot more challenging
these days because they used to have these development programs
(09:36):
where they're signing up these, you know, superstar kids that
they think are going to make it.They sign you up to drive and
you want to get paid much, but you know over time you would
start to make it and they get, they recoup their investment
because you drive for cheap for the first few years and then
your career is going, which is agreat deal that's not available
anymore. That those programs don't exist
anymore. The best teams will buy the best
(09:58):
drivers. That's that's but.
They're typically more established.
They're not rolling the dice on a 15 year old kid anymore.
They won't so. How?
OK, so now Fast forward to this moment in time, the young Joey
Logano, growing up in Connecticut or growing up right
here in Charlotte, NC without those programs, without those
opportunities, how does their path end up that they're still
(10:21):
racing next to you in the Daytona 500?
Yeah, I mean there's, there's different paths and like I said,
it's harder than it was when I did it.
So it's hard for me to say what is the correct path now, right?
A lot of it is like the relationships that you build
along the way. What you do off the racetrack as
a race car driver is almost as important as what you do on the
(10:44):
racetrack because you have thesesponsors.
It's not like other sports wherethe the team is sponsored and
you're part of the team in there.
Somehow you are, but you're like, you're the face.
The driver ends up being the face of the of the, the car,
right, the team and, you know, the drivers were making the
appearances like, so you have tobe really good at that stuff.
(11:06):
You have to be able to build those relationships and somehow
convince these these sponsors that there's going to be a real
return on their investment. And it's hard to do that when
you haven't made it yet. Like that's where it gets really
challenged. It's easier for us now.
Like for me now, like we've won some championships.
We've proven there's real returnon their investment.
OK, we can bring sponsors into the door.
(11:28):
But as a rookie coming in, how do you do that?
Or even if you're not in the cuplevel, if you're running trucks
or you're running even late models, like you got to find
some local companies that are willing to invest in your career
so you can keep progressing. So the amount of work it takes
for a young driver to keep moving up through the ranks and
hopefully have some people behind them that are going to
(11:50):
like buy into what he's doing, it's really, really hard to do
all. Right, so, so you're young, but
you're successful, right? You're moving up the ranks fast.
There's a lot of success, obviously, but I'm sure there's
some failures and you're maybe racing guys a lot older than
you, more mature than you, more experienced, and you're just
kind of figuring it out on the fly alongside with your dad and
(12:12):
your family and your support system.
Take us back to that meant so much about what we talked about
with our athletes and with best practices is about you can have
all the skill set in the world, right?
You were obviously very talentedat what you do.
You had an innate ability to to drive and, and, and process and
all that. But there's also like a mental
component to all of this handling success, handling
(12:33):
failure. But now you're doing it at
12:13, 14-15 years old as a professional.
Most 14 and 15 year olds are just going to high school making
mistakes. So take us back like about the
mentality of it, like how did you balance success as an early
age, failure at an early age, expectations, Like think back to
(12:55):
those years, like give us some insight into like what that
world looked like for you mentally.
So I mean, at a young age, I don't feel like I don't want
this to come across wrong, but Ididn't lose much like I would
just, which helps I'd show up a win.
We didn't know why I just was able to win and were.
The kids you were, the guys you were racing your age, or were
(13:16):
they? Older.
They were old. So when?
You're 1214, they're 20 or older.
Oh, you're grown. You're racing grown.
Man, yeah, absolutely. OK, got it.
And So what we would, we could still show up and and win and
like they were really there wasn't failure that's ever
happened in my career until I got to the very top, until I got
to the Cup level, which is. Hard sometimes.
(13:39):
Right. So like, and that was hard for
me because I'd never experiencedfailure before.
So yeah, I think, OK, you're a kid that's been racing since you
were seven. You win, win, win, win, win,
win. You get signed up by Joe Gibbs
Racing. OK, great.
Move up, get into the Xfinity Series, which is one level down
from Cup. Win the third race right off the
bat, everything's like, oh, OK, I'm still winning.
(14:00):
Then Tony Stewart, who was driving the 20 cars a time.
This is when he started Stewart Haas and he said, OK, I'm not
going to resign. I'm going to start my own, my
own deal. My plan was to race 2 years in
Xfinity and then move up in the Cup.
Well, now I got at the time it was like 5 or 6 races under my
belt of in Xfinity and they're like, OK, we want to put you
into the 20 car, high profile car.
(14:23):
Home Depot's on it. Like it's won two championships
with that team, that crew chief,there's like that, that
leadership model we're going to put you in.
I'm 18 years old. I'm, I've never lost before.
Sure. Like I, I felt like I was going
to be fine. I was going to be, it was going
to be easy for me and I failed. I jumped in that thing and I had
(14:43):
the the guys that I thought couldn't drive a lick were
whooping my ass like they were just driving away.
What was the difference? They were just.
Well, everybody, everyone's got the talent, right?
When you get to the top, there'severybody is amazingly talented
and the amount of experience andthe, the, the work ethic that I
(15:06):
had was not there right 'cause Ijust showed and go like I can
just show up and win. I didn't have to work at my
craft ever before. And so it took a long time.
It took, you know, first two years of my cup career was
pretty weak. Started getting a little better
in my third year, but they already started trying to make
some changes that they were going to, you know, Take Me Out
of the car. It wasn't wasn't as successful
(15:26):
as any other debate is it is thecar.
It's expected to win championships.
Right now. I'm four years into my career.
I've won two races and not many top fives or anything in between
those two races. So it got to the point where,
OK, you're you're out, Joe, you don't have a ride for you
anymore. Like, and then you're like, wow,
(15:47):
like, so I went through those first four years were the most
challenging of my career becauseI had to work like learn what I
learned to lose, for one thing, learn how to go to work.
And I got to the fourth year of my contract and it wasn't good
enough. Like I, I went to work, I got
better and I'll see in progress.It wasn't good enough.
(16:08):
And by the grace of God, the 22 car opened up at that point.
And that's for Rodger, Penske, Shell and Pennzoil.
And they needed a stable driver.I mean, it's the one thing I
always had going for me. I didn't go out there partying.
I never like I was, I was focused.
I wasn't doing stupid things. I was going to do anything you
asked me to do. I was never going to say no to
(16:30):
to anybody. So they needed that and I needed
a second chance. And I walked into the doors
there at Team Penske 12 years ago now and have a left and he
was able to really build a team around me and have a second
chance at coming in as a 22 yearold instead of being a 15 year
old. That's a big difference.
(16:51):
Do you learn a lot? So that was that was the hardest
time for me was those, those first four years of going
through that. Right.
But would you say there would beall these trophies and these Cup
series, three Cup Series wins and we can go around this whole
room and point at all the major races, the All Star race this
year at the iconic speed? Like, do you think you'd have
all of that success without thatfour years of struggle?
(17:14):
Is the most important years of my life and I didn't realize it
at the time because it was awful.
But do you learn? That's when you learn the most
about yourself is in the trenches.
And it doesn't mean that life's easy now.
Like now that we've won it a fewtimes, there's still like
there's moments where you feel like, gosh, I do, I even know
how to drive anymore. And then you figure it out again
(17:35):
and you win a few. I remember that.
It's a roller coaster you take. Them we say to the kids on our
teams we coach the biggest impediment to future success is
current success. Yeah, it is the the if you want
to. That's a great point.
It's so hard to win once you've shown how to win.
Now there's a lot of layers, right?
There's the human element of just complacent.
(17:56):
I'm complacent. Expectations are higher now
other people are gunning for you, right?
There's a million reasons why the hardest thing in the world
is to have success and then sustain success.
And that is so hard. I'm going to ask you one thing
before we move on to some more like higher level things that we
love to talk about with our guests.
But something that we hear a lotabout from from our fans, from
(18:19):
parents, coaches is like, again,go back to that early experience
in whatever the sport is. And there's that boundary
between you want to have successso that you develop the love,
you develop the growth mindset. You want to continue to work at
it. No one wants to do something
that they're bad at. No one wants to show up every
day to practice and never get the results on the field.
(18:40):
But then there's the flip side. And I'm hearing you talk about
your early racing days and I'm it's starting my my light bulbs
going off. I'm saying there is an element
where too much early success is also a little bit of a hindrance
right now. You were racing older guys, you
were moving up the ladder. You weren't just racing other
your peers. So you were challenging yourself
and still finding early success.But just what would you say to
(19:04):
families with young athletes, drivers, sticking ball, whatever
the sport is like learning thoselessons at 12 instead of at 18
to 22 like the story you just told?
Would you have been more prepared to handle it at 1819 if
maybe you did have a little morebumps in the road when you were
young? I've been way tougher.
(19:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I was very cocky and
arrogant when I first showed up because I've never lost.
I mean, I had every reason to believe it.
Of course I'm the best. Like who's better?
Like I'm, I don't get beat. That's what I thought.
And I, I wish I had a little bitmore failure earlier in my
(19:46):
career, But I mean what? You can't change that.
No, but I, I mean to, to answer your question too about like
kids sports these days versus like we talked about how like I
was the advanced one doing all this stuff.
And now all the kids are doing this right, like racing a late
model full size car at 12 years old used to be like, are you
(20:08):
freaking crazy? Nobody does that.
Now there's 12 year old kids racing full size cars around the
country like it's normal. And I, as somebody that went
through that, now I look at a 12year old kid racing a late
model, I go and I think it's crazy.
And I, I think it's too much, like I think it's too soon now.
(20:29):
And it probably depends on the kid and it depends on the
parent. Because I think like for me, my
father and I had a blast. And like, that was the one thing
like my dad, I said, he did so many things right.
But the most important thing he always did with me was that we
made sure we had fun, like we enjoyed it.
Was there pressure around? Him to win.
(20:50):
There's always he never said it.He never like chewed me out if I
made a mistake. Like he was always supportive,
but he's an intense person. And you always, I mean, you
always want to win for your parents, right?
Like that's like a natural. Parent has their different
approach. Some are more subtle, some are a
little more outward about it. Yeah, I mean, he did more like
(21:11):
we're doing it together. Like we're kind of like a team.
Like it was like a partnership. We're doing it together.
He never said that, right? You're a kid, right?
But but looking back at it, that's how we did it.
Now I've seen lots of kids show up to the racetrack that it's
dad's dream. It's not, it's not the kids
dream and it happens in every sport.
It's dad's dream. Dad didn't make it, but I want
(21:34):
my kid to make it and they robbed their kids childhood from
it. Like I love driving cars to this
day, if I get 10 minutes to kill, I'm jumping on my four
Wheeler and I'm driving through the woods.
I love it. I absolutely love if I go to
racetrack to go testing, I'm going to run more laps than
anybody because I freaking love it.
And that's if that's not in you as a child that you absolutely
(22:00):
freaking love it and it's all you want to do.
Don't do it. Like do it.
If you want to do it, do it withthe intentions of learning key
lessons that are going to help you in life, right.
If your child does not absolutely eat, breathe, sleep
that sport, make sure it's fun #1 and make sure they learn some
(22:23):
lessons, right? Because there's so many lessons
to be learned in sports. Talk about one of them losing,
right? Learning to lose.
These days, a lot of kids have never experienced it, right?
They're coddled, right? Like they got to learn, like to
take those hits sometimes. I just think there's so many
lessons in sports, but you can'ttake the fun out of it because
you're only a kid once. And to me, they're my most
(22:45):
cherished memories. But I seen a lot of kids that I
grew up with where it was like, not that for them and their dad
would be chewing them out after a race and I'd be sitting there
like almost feeling bad for him.Like after you beat him, like
you're like, shit. Like I didn't realize that would
happen. Like it's just it's.
It happens in every I mean. It happens in baseball, it
happens in Little League. Anything like he just I hate.
(23:08):
That is the one thing I hate themost.
Like, and my son now, he's my oldest is 6, and he's kind of
showed a little bit of interest in racing, but he's a little bit
nervous to go out there and racewith the cars.
But even when we have gone out there, it's weird because we
show up and it's Joey Logano's kid, Hudson, not Hudson.
(23:29):
Like, I was Tom Logano's son, the garbage man from
Connecticut, right? Like they went like there was
no. Expectation.
This interview with Joey Logano is brought to you by our friends
at Players Health, a company providing solutions to protect
young athletes while playing thesports they love.
We sat down with their CEO, Tyree Burks to hear how Players
(23:51):
Health is making safer environments for athletes.
An incident specifically around emotional, physical, sexual
abuse within a youth athlete will change their life forever.
I always like to say that if players help, our focus is to
make sure that the transaction between an athlete and their
sports organization. We wanted to be positive.
It limits the likelihood that something that will change a
(24:11):
life forever from happening. We only want sports to be
positive. We can't get bigger than that.
For more information on players health, visit their website to
find out how they can help you. This interview is also brought
to you by Max UA Youth Sports training program focused on
unlocking your child's potentialthrough mindset development.
We spoke with the founders of Max U, Dan Greco and Brian
(24:33):
Kornfeld to learn how Max U is empowered young athletes.
How do you swing a baseball bat?How do you catch a football?
How do you shoot a basketball orswing a tennis racket?
Those are skills are being worked on all the time, but
these mental skills can truly matter so much.
More so by having a simple, easyto use tool that can get out to
the masses. We're just really, really
(24:54):
excited about what this can meanfor our mission and what it can
mean to honestly change a generation.
To learn more about Maxu, visit maxu.co and use Code Youth, Inc
24 for $10 off a yearly subscription.
Now back to our interview with Joey Logano.
I wasn't going to ask you about it right now, but since you
brought it up, how how do you how do you plan on handling if
he does stay in that racing world?
(25:15):
He's not going to shake it. And that was something when I
talked to Dale on. You think we talked to Dale.
I talked to Kyle Busch, whose son's doing it, Obviously Dale
when he was a kid growing up. Expectations are real, whether
it's fair, unfair, justified. There's going to be people
rooting against Hudson. There's going to be people who
love him because they love his dad.
You're going to get everything in between like and as you start
(25:36):
like processing that as he gets older, like, how do you guys
anticipate handling that? I, I think some of the like
going back to the lessons, losing when you're young, being
very important for you. Like there's a balance of
confidence versus learning, learning what life's all about.
And he's already showing up in the limelight.
(25:57):
I don't like that in the 1st place, but there's not much I
can do about it. But we're not going to show up
with the nicest car. He's going to work on his car.
He's going to like it's it's going to be an average car with
a few times we have gone and raced.
We showed up in the back of a pickup truck.
I said it's a freaking go Kart. What do I need?
I need something to change the tires.
I need a tool bag with like a few tools and an air pressure
(26:19):
gauge. Like I don't need much.
He's six years old. He can barely hold the thing
wide open all year on a racetrack.
Why do I need all this other stuff?
And you see other kids racing there and they got the logos,
tents, they got all the nice gear.
No, I'm like, if he doesn't clean his car, then he's going
to race a dirty car. That's on him.
Like, because I want him to learn those lessons when it
(26:40):
doesn't matter, because he's sixyears old, it doesn't matter.
Now is the time. Now is the time to do it. 17
It's a different animal. So if and he doesn't push me a
whole bunch to race, he just wants to drive his four Wheeler
every day out here with dad, I'mfine with that.
Perfect six years old. Like I'm not going to push you
to do it. If you want to do it, great.
If you want to. He wants to play basketball
right now. Cool, I can't help you in that,
(27:00):
but I'll be there to help. Like I'll do it whatever I can,
right. Like I'm not a basketball
player. I don't know what to do, but
it's so interesting. But that's fine, I think,
because I want those lessons to be learned more than anything
right now, because if he wins a race right now when he's 6, you
think that's going to help him make it?
It's. Relevant.
Never. In the big picture, it's
relevant. It doesn't matter.
We say that all the time now as kids are chasing the baseball
(27:22):
world and volleyball and basketball.
And I say, I promise you, no college coach is ever going to
walk in and say, can you pull uphow many tournaments he won at
12 years old? Show me what team he was on.
I promise you, no one's asking what your record was at 12 U
baseball, 12 U volleyball. It's not worth spending the
money yet. It's just too young.
It's not worth spending the timeto do all that.
(27:42):
It's worth him learning the lessons right now.
A couple other things before I let you go.
Obviously racing looks like an individual sport.
It's the car, the driver, but itis a I've been on, I've been in
pit row. I've been down to the tracks for
the All Star race and the Coca-Cola fight, like all the
big races, Like there is a lot of team element to this.
Like all right, I want to be on Joey Logano, top driver, cup
(28:07):
series champ, top of the top, the non negotiables for you.
You want to be on my team, whether it's the pit crew or the
tire changer or the guy that theJackman, whatever it is like as
you put your team together like,what are those qualities of an
individual sport that has to operate in a team setting in
order to build garages of trophies?
(28:29):
Right. And so to answer that, you're
going to take a step back a little bit, right?
So the driver is like the quarterback of the team, like
he's the Jazz. Man face.
Sure, sure. That's actually, you're kind of
right. I'm just kidding.
So like it's and the the crew chief is like the coach and then
there's the owner that and like everybody's got to make their
(28:51):
decisions on who's on the team. But then there's also day-to-day
people that are that are helpingto run all this stuff.
And so it's it's not just on me.I'm just part of the team.
I'm a leader of the team, but the number one thing to me is
ownership. You got it.
Like take ownership in yourself,in your actions.
(29:13):
That's the number one thing. You, you, I'd rather some, you
got to look inward first before you start pointing fingers.
And I'm, I'm the same way. Like that's, that's something
that I do all the time because I'm, I'm going to be the one to
kick myself before anybody else does.
No one's going to tell me something that I haven't already
thought about about myself at least, because I'm you're
(29:34):
naturally hard on yourself, or at least I am.
No, no. But I want other people to be
the same way. I don't want someone to make
excuses to say it's always because of this or because of
that. Like, no, like could you have
controlled that? Could you have controlled that?
Like the number one thing that Ican't stand, a lot of times,
it's like when we go to superspeedways in Daytona,
Talladega, you know, a lot of people say it's luck.
(29:55):
And so you just got in the rightplace at the right time and it's
just lucky and you just didn't get in the right.
No, because there's a lot of decisions made that put you in
that spot way before that might be 40 laps ago, might been in
the garage before he even started the the weekend that put
you in that spot. I don't believe in luck.
There's zero luck involved in insports in my mind.
(30:17):
A lot of them are just decisions.
And you have to be willing to take ownership and look far
enough back on why that happened.
And my team does a fantastic jobat that.
Paul Wolf, my crew chief. I mean, there ain't nobody that
shows a better example of that than Paul.
But but that's what we are like that we're kind of an old school
race team from that perspective.And yeah, that's that to me is
(30:40):
the number one thing that you got to have on a race team.
How about the mental approach before the race, during the
week? Like it seems like a sport that
requires so much mental toughness, focus.
I mean, you're, you're your brain.
You are being stimulated and occupied to your to your point,
making decisions in real time reaction.
(31:01):
Like, is there anything you do, anything throughout the racing
world that you know drivers do? Like the mental side, I think is
such an ignored component to just sports in general and.
So much of it, right? So, and, and to me it's more
important like you work on your skills, you're hitting, you're
throwing, you're running, you'rejumping, but like very few
people work on their, their mental approach, routine, focus.
(31:23):
Like, are there things in the racing world that you do, other
guys do that you feel like have allowed you to separate
yourself, prepare yourself? Yeah, I think that being able to
handle pressure is the most important thing, right.
And I look at our race team or myself even like we show up in
the playoffs way more than we doall year long.
Our regular season, even this year, our regular season wasn't
(31:45):
nothing to be be happy about, but our playoffs were fantastic.
And it's happened like that all three times and, and, and other
times throughout the year, like it's just high pressure moments
is when we show up. It's not an accident that it's
like that. Some people are are born to love
that pressure. Some people have to learn to
(32:06):
love the pressure and it's nevercomfortable, right?
It's not like you like feel comfort and pressure.
But for me, I find ways to back myself up against the wall
because and find a way to dig out of it because that's just
makes me better, right? I'm better off going out there
and calling, calling my hit before it happens to put that
(32:30):
pressure on me because it just makes me work harder and be more
prepared and all those type of things.
So like for me, I know I'm not the fastest race car driver on
the racetrack. I know that I try to be and I
try to work on that craft all the time.
But I also know where my strengths are and I think I'm
the most mental tough race car driver on the racetrack.
(32:50):
And that's why I think where it's late race restarts or it's
racing for a championship in thefinal four, it's going to be
really hard to beat us because of that.
That's our strength. So we play that.
And and how do I feel more prepared than anyone?
Well, one, I've been doing it for a long time.
That always helps. But two, I'm going to out
prepare my over any other driver.
(33:11):
I'm going to know what's going on.
There should be no surprises, inother words, of what's going to
happen in this race. I should be fully prepared for
it. And when I feel fully prepared,
it's comes natural after that, like I don't do the pressure,
the the stress that you feel comes down a lot and you can
focus in way better. It's just all about the prep.
(33:34):
It's all about the little crap that you don't think matters and
you may never see in the race, but at least there's not going
to be a surprise when it does happen all.
Right, last question. So all that being said, you win
the 24 Cup series, great playoffrun.
Give me one example. Give me one critical moment why
you were at your best when it mattered and that was all the
(33:57):
difference. Is there one thing off the top
of your head, a decision? You mentioned late start, you
know, late race restart. Like is there anything that
comes to mind that's like a great kind of bow to tie around
like everything you just laid out preparation both before the
race, during mental toughness, adversity.
Is there like one thing that pops into mind is like this?
Is all of it playing out in a real moment?
(34:19):
Yeah, I guess it's so hard to say as one because it takes so
much to get to it and there's somany people that lead up to.
But you're asking me personally,the final restart of the
championship race in Phoenix, 50something laps to go, we
restarted 5th. And before you get to a restart,
you get to choose what line you're in, right?
(34:40):
So you have to study which lane is the best lane to be in, but
also where's your competitors? And the way it lined up is the
24. Byron, he was the leader, he
picked the bottom, but he had two of his teammates right
there. And so the the five and the 9,
we're on a 2 outside lanes and then there's a 20 in front of me
and then me 5th. And so I thought, shoot, 24 is
(35:01):
in a really good place here. The teammates are going to kind
of let them up. They're not racing for a
championship. He should be fine.
The pressure got to him. He missed Turn 1.
We went up the racetrack, let the 20 get underneath them.
All I did is stay calm through the situation.
Right now, the 20s up next to them, the 20 makes a mistake
racing for the lead and slides up the racetrack.
It just opens the door for me. So like the point was the whole
(35:22):
the whole time as I was fully prepared for what can happen and
I stayed calm and they didn't and opened up the door for us to
take the championship. And it came down to two mistakes
on those guys and we were able to be perfect through that
restart and then holding off my teammate Blaney, who ran me down
at the end of the race, but ableto hold them off.
(35:43):
It was is intense and awesome, but it all just happened because
of the prep. That was really all that
happened. Well dude, I can't tell you man
to to, to be able to pick the brain of high performers, people
that are used to operating in critical moments, intense
moments, and not just have periodic success.
I I agree with you about the element of luck.
(36:03):
Like there is nothing lucky about people that can repeat
success over and over and over extended periods of time against
the best in the world, against people that's only job is to
unseat you and to get next year's trophy.
So to like, again, in a world that I don't pretend to know,
but I believe all these practices, whether it's racing,
(36:24):
football, business, these practices of high achievers, all
the principles align. They're all the same.
It's just how you apply it to whatever field you're in.
So for you to kind of share thismindset, share your back story
and your history of why you are who you are and have had the
success. I think it's going to be very,
very appealing and interesting to our to our viewers on you
(36:45):
think man. So appreciate you taking a
couple minutes to Share your story.
Absolutely. Great compliments when
somebody's done well, even more than me.
So I appreciate it. So thank you.
Appreciate you man, this was awesome.
Hey, what's going on everybody? Greg Olson here and we're back
for another special interview here on Youth Inc.
Last month, I had the pleasure of sitting down with three time
NASCAR Cup Series champion Joey Logano.
We talked about Joey's upbringing in the world of
motorsport, how he has developedas a driver throughout his
career and what advice he would give parents raising young
athletes today. This is a must listen episode,
(00:20):
so sit back, relax and we'll catch you next time right here
on You Think Joey Logano free time NASCAR Cup Series champ.
Thank you so much man, for for you to take a couple minutes and
talk to us about your journey kind of how you view sports.
We were talking a little before we started on just a little bit
of your background. We're going to dive into here in
a second, but appreciate you welcoming us to this incredible
(00:42):
museum garage, whatever you wantto call it.
Garage. Yeah.
Juliano. Appreciate you man.
Thanks for being with us here onYou Think.
Thank you. Looking forward to having a good
conversation. And yeah, this is a shop, so
it's kind of a fun place to hangout and stores.
And yeah, it's culture. I would venture it's the only,
maybe the only place in the world where there's a model TA
(01:04):
Daytona 500 and a Cheese it trophy all in the same room.
So it we're checking a lot of box.
It sounds about right to me though.
I mean if. Anyone else right there?
We're going to find that guy. And find out who he is.
But no. So one of the best things we
love about you think and kind ofdiving into the youth sports
experience and the journey. What's very unique here in
(01:24):
America, an ever changing landscape.
Take us back to your journey growing up in Connecticut,
right? Born in Connecticut, then you
went to Georgia to kind of further your racing career.
And just I got to say, I have a young kid growing up back then.
Like how do you venture into theworld of racing?
Like just give us you're not going to the local Little League
and picking up a baseball bat. Like what does that look like?
(01:46):
Well, that's the, the challenging thing about
Motorsports is because it's hard, like you said, you can't
just go to your local sporting goods store and buy a race car
like, and, and it's very complexon top of that, what kind of car
should I get? Well, and then how much air do I
put in the tires? What gear do I put in the car?
Like literally you have no clue,right?
And even with my son now, he rana couple of races.
(02:09):
I showed up to the racetrack andI don't know what to do with the
car. I don't race little cars like I
got to kind of, and I even know what to do.
So I got to kind of relearn, butthat's the most challenging
thing for, for young racers or kids that want to race is, and
it's a, it's a sport where your parents have to be involved with
you to help support you and, andtake you to the track,
(02:30):
obviously, but also the financial impacts big.
So for me, I just got a yard cart for Christmas.
That's what I got. Santa Claus brought one year and
I was like 6 loved it, right. Like my dad was more of an
athlete that can you know, he played baseball and and
basketball through high school. Like I didn't get that gene, you
know, like, and and he was in the cars and he had a trucking
(02:52):
company. And so I was naturally just
around that loved driving my go Kart every day.
When I got home, they realized that we started racing.
Car is called quarter midgets, which is kind of like a go Kart
but it's got a rolled cage and seatbelts.
So how old are you at this time when you're actually in the?
Seven, you know, it's got to be a year later.
Yeah. You're first grade start as a
kid, first. Second grade.
(03:13):
Yep. And then so that was up in
Connecticut, Raced those for a while.
And then my father sold his company and Connecticut just
wanted to move South. And so we moved to Georgia for a
while, started racing cars, Bandoleros, Legends, cars, kind
of little bigger cars getting bigger.
And at that point I was very, very fortunate because my father
(03:35):
sold his company and he committed the next 8-9 years to
just go and racing with his son.And there's not many people have
the ability to do that. But it was something very
special for for me and moments Iwill cherish forever.
But it also progressed my careerso fast, faster than I think any
(03:56):
of us are ready for and faster than anyone has in the past.
Like I was breaking barriers coming up as a kid to the point
to where like I was always waiting on my birthday to drive
the next car out. And there's a few times we may
have fudge the birth certificateto race a little bit sooner.
Secret safe with us. It lasted for a while.
No one's going to watch this. It didn't last that long, but it
(04:17):
lasted for a few races and it was fun.
But that was kind of like we were always pushing the barrier
on on. I'm just moving up as quick as
possible because as soon as I started winning in something, my
parents theory was, well, you'reonly as good as the people
you're racing against. So if you can beat them, you
better move up. And so it happened quick for me.
Now all the things I did is verynormal, like the pace of how
(04:39):
kids. You were doing it your peers of
your age all across the country or just where you were living,
like across the country. It's pretty universal.
So is it So take me like depending on where you live, is
there like a geographic component to like what the
experience is like racing and all that?
Like if you live in the Northeast versus here and
(05:00):
obviously North Carolina, probably more opportunity, like
what does that look like around the country for young kids?
Yeah. So up up north, the quarter
midgets were really big at the time and they still are, you
know, and then like the Midwest is more like dirt where they run
like midgets and Sprint cars andthose type of things.
And even that out West was like that.
And then here in the Southeast, I mean, there is a variety of
(05:23):
cars to drive and a lot of it depends on like, what do you
want to do? Like if you're a kid that just
wants to go racing, like, OK, well, there's, there's some,
some racing that's the most costeffective.
And my recommendation is when your kids young, it doesn't
really matter like what they're driving, as long as they're
behind the wheel, they're learning the the basics, right?
(05:43):
But then you got to decide, OK, do I want to go open wheel
racing? Do I want to drive Indy cars and
F1 cars? Like what's the dream?
Or do you want to, you know, do you like racing dirt and the
dream is to be a Sprint car driver or is it to go to the
NASCAR route? And any of those can be
interchangeable, but you kind ofwant to race of the type of cars
that you're going to be racing if you make it.
(06:05):
So that's kind of what we ended up doing.
My dream was to be a NASCAR driver.
And so we stayed short track. Asphalt, big heavy cars.
That's what a NASCAR race car is.
So you said something super interesting because I think a
lot of families across all different sports, team sports,
individual sports, whatever stick and ball is that balance
between when your kid is young, even if they're good.
(06:26):
There's this balance out there right now of saying some
families chase it to the ends ofthe earth.
They're on travel teams. It's 12 months a year.
We're flying to California and Arizona and Florida.
We're seeking out the biggest tournaments.
We're 8910 years old and we're playing national travel,
baseball, basketball, volleyball, whatever it is.
And then there's other families that say we don't need that,
right? Just get the ball, get the bat
(06:46):
in your hand, go down to the local Little League and just be
an 810 year old and play baseball and it'll all even out
at the end. So now you put yourself in your
shoes, you're fortunate your dad's able to make this time
investment. You're able to go kind of
continue to chase this each mark.
At what point did you guys continue to chase this and say,
we're going to shoot for the moon and then also take a step
(07:07):
back and say, I'm seven, I'm 10?Or did you guys not think that
way? Like, I think that's the the
struggle a lot of families are trying to figure out.
Like when is too much too much? But here you are sitting here,
the best driver in the world. Are you here if you didn't push
it that much when you were young?
To answer your question, I thinkthe answer is I would have been.
(07:27):
I think I would have been here either way.
OK, it might have the, the time of when I got here would have
been different and who I am today would be different as
well. But I think if you win the right
races in front of the right people and, and, and the
opportunities there, it's one thing.
But for me it was, it's a littledifferent because when I first
started, you know, getting more recognized, it's back in 2000
(07:50):
and five, 2006 and there is driver development programs
because finance is one of the hardest things with Motorsports.
Yeah, give people, give people an idea of like what that looks
like. So I mean, if you're racing like
say you're racing legends cars, right?
And then you can do that pretty much anywhere around the
country. You know you got 1520 grand in a
race car and you got to get a trailer to pull.
(08:12):
How old are you doing this? You're, you're anywhere between
9:00 to 15, like anywhere in there.
You're young, right? And then you got to get tires,
you got to get tools, you got toget a trailer, you got to get a
truck to pull the trailer you got, and then you got to bring
it to the racetrack. Then you're going to wreck it.
Then you got to fix it. And you know, like all of a
sudden you're in this. You're in a way over 100 grand.
You think it's about what? It's about 100 grand a year, or
(08:32):
I mean a. 100 grand. How many times you're going to
race? I don't know.
Yeah, right. Like.
So what relatives? What do you want to do and and
what level do you want to do it?Do you want your cars to be
nice? Do you want to win?
You got to have nice cars, right?
Like you can't just like the carmatters.
The car is half of the of the battle, right?
So that's where it gets kind of tricky.
(08:53):
And so there's lessons learned for the kids working on the car,
building the car, understanding how cars work.
Like there's all those are very,very valuable lessons because
when you do make it, you still have to know all that stuff to
help your engineers today. But for going back for me, I got
signed up at Joe Gibbs Racing when I was 15 years old.
(09:14):
And at that point, we never put another nickel into my career.
I got started, I got paid when Iwas 15 to drive race cars.
That doesn't happen today at all.
Like to this point, like until you get to Cup, people are
paying to drive cars all the waythrough.
So to make it, you got to have millions and millions of dollars
behind you to, to get you going.So it's a lot more challenging
these days because they used to have these development programs
(09:36):
where they're signing up these, you know, superstar kids that
they think are going to make it.They sign you up to drive and
you want to get paid much, but you know over time you would
start to make it and they get, they recoup their investment
because you drive for cheap for the first few years and then
your career is going, which is agreat deal that's not available
anymore. That those programs don't exist
anymore. The best teams will buy the best
(09:58):
drivers. That's that's but.
They're typically more established.
They're not rolling the dice on a 15 year old kid anymore.
They won't so. How?
OK, so now Fast forward to this moment in time, the young Joey
Logano, growing up in Connecticut or growing up right
here in Charlotte, NC without those programs, without those
opportunities, how does their path end up that they're still
(10:21):
racing next to you in the Daytona 500?
Yeah, I mean there's, there's different paths and like I said,
it's harder than it was when I did it.
So it's hard for me to say what is the correct path now, right?
A lot of it is like the relationships that you build
along the way. What you do off the racetrack as
a race car driver is almost as important as what you do on the
(10:44):
racetrack because you have thesesponsors.
It's not like other sports wherethe the team is sponsored and
you're part of the team in there.
Somehow you are, but you're like, you're the face.
The driver ends up being the face of the of the, the car,
right, the team and, you know, the drivers were making the
appearances like, so you have tobe really good at that stuff.
(11:06):
You have to be able to build those relationships and somehow
convince these these sponsors that there's going to be a real
return on their investment. And it's hard to do that when
you haven't made it yet. Like that's where it gets really
challenged. It's easier for us now.
Like for me now, like we've won some championships.
We've proven there's real returnon their investment.
OK, we can bring sponsors into the door.
(11:28):
But as a rookie coming in, how do you do that?
Or even if you're not in the cuplevel, if you're running trucks
or you're running even late models, like you got to find
some local companies that are willing to invest in your career
so you can keep progressing. So the amount of work it takes
for a young driver to keep moving up through the ranks and
hopefully have some people behind them that are going to
(11:50):
like buy into what he's doing, it's really, really hard to do
all. Right, so, so you're young, but
you're successful, right? You're moving up the ranks fast.
There's a lot of success, obviously, but I'm sure there's
some failures and you're maybe racing guys a lot older than
you, more mature than you, more experienced, and you're just
kind of figuring it out on the fly alongside with your dad and
(12:12):
your family and your support system.
Take us back to that meant so much about what we talked about
with our athletes and with best practices is about you can have
all the skill set in the world, right?
You were obviously very talentedat what you do.
You had an innate ability to to drive and, and, and process and
all that. But there's also like a mental
component to all of this handling success, handling
(12:33):
failure. But now you're doing it at
12:13, 14-15 years old as a professional.
Most 14 and 15 year olds are just going to high school making
mistakes. So take us back like about the
mentality of it, like how did you balance success as an early
age, failure at an early age, expectations, Like think back to
(12:55):
those years, like give us some insight into like what that
world looked like for you mentally.
So I mean, at a young age, I don't feel like I don't want
this to come across wrong, but Ididn't lose much like I would
just, which helps I'd show up a win.
We didn't know why I just was able to win and were.
The kids you were, the guys you were racing your age, or were
(13:16):
they? Older.
They were old. So when?
You're 1214, they're 20 or older.
Oh, you're grown. You're racing grown.
Man, yeah, absolutely. OK, got it.
And So what we would, we could still show up and and win and
like they were really there wasn't failure that's ever
happened in my career until I got to the very top, until I got
to the Cup level, which is. Hard sometimes.
(13:39):
Right. So like, and that was hard for
me because I'd never experiencedfailure before.
So yeah, I think, OK, you're a kid that's been racing since you
were seven. You win, win, win, win, win,
win. You get signed up by Joe Gibbs
Racing. OK, great.
Move up, get into the Xfinity Series, which is one level down
from Cup. Win the third race right off the
bat, everything's like, oh, OK, I'm still winning.
(14:00):
Then Tony Stewart, who was driving the 20 cars a time.
This is when he started Stewart Haas and he said, OK, I'm not
going to resign. I'm going to start my own, my
own deal. My plan was to race 2 years in
Xfinity and then move up in the Cup.
Well, now I got at the time it was like 5 or 6 races under my
belt of in Xfinity and they're like, OK, we want to put you
into the 20 car, high profile car.
(14:23):
Home Depot's on it. Like it's won two championships
with that team, that crew chief,there's like that, that
leadership model we're going to put you in.
I'm 18 years old. I'm, I've never lost before.
Sure. Like I, I felt like I was going
to be fine. I was going to be, it was going
to be easy for me and I failed. I jumped in that thing and I had
(14:43):
the the guys that I thought couldn't drive a lick were
whooping my ass like they were just driving away.
What was the difference? They were just.
Well, everybody, everyone's got the talent, right?
When you get to the top, there'severybody is amazingly talented
and the amount of experience andthe, the, the work ethic that I
(15:06):
had was not there right 'cause Ijust showed and go like I can
just show up and win. I didn't have to work at my
craft ever before. And so it took a long time.
It took, you know, first two years of my cup career was
pretty weak. Started getting a little better
in my third year, but they already started trying to make
some changes that they were going to, you know, Take Me Out
of the car. It wasn't wasn't as successful
(15:26):
as any other debate is it is thecar.
It's expected to win championships.
Right now. I'm four years into my career.
I've won two races and not many top fives or anything in between
those two races. So it got to the point where,
OK, you're you're out, Joe, you don't have a ride for you
anymore. Like, and then you're like, wow,
(15:47):
like, so I went through those first four years were the most
challenging of my career becauseI had to work like learn what I
learned to lose, for one thing, learn how to go to work.
And I got to the fourth year of my contract and it wasn't good
enough. Like I, I went to work, I got
better and I'll see in progress.It wasn't good enough.
(16:08):
And by the grace of God, the 22 car opened up at that point.
And that's for Rodger, Penske, Shell and Pennzoil.
And they needed a stable driver.I mean, it's the one thing I
always had going for me. I didn't go out there partying.
I never like I was, I was focused.
I wasn't doing stupid things. I was going to do anything you
asked me to do. I was never going to say no to
(16:30):
to anybody. So they needed that and I needed
a second chance. And I walked into the doors
there at Team Penske 12 years ago now and have a left and he
was able to really build a team around me and have a second
chance at coming in as a 22 yearold instead of being a 15 year
old. That's a big difference.
(16:51):
Do you learn a lot? So that was that was the hardest
time for me was those, those first four years of going
through that. Right.
But would you say there would beall these trophies and these Cup
series, three Cup Series wins and we can go around this whole
room and point at all the major races, the All Star race this
year at the iconic speed? Like, do you think you'd have
all of that success without thatfour years of struggle?
(17:14):
Is the most important years of my life and I didn't realize it
at the time because it was awful.
But do you learn? That's when you learn the most
about yourself is in the trenches.
And it doesn't mean that life's easy now.
Like now that we've won it a fewtimes, there's still like
there's moments where you feel like, gosh, I do, I even know
how to drive anymore. And then you figure it out again
(17:35):
and you win a few. I remember that.
It's a roller coaster you take. Them we say to the kids on our
teams we coach the biggest impediment to future success is
current success. Yeah, it is the the if you want
to. That's a great point.
It's so hard to win once you've shown how to win.
Now there's a lot of layers, right?
There's the human element of just complacent.
(17:56):
I'm complacent. Expectations are higher now
other people are gunning for you, right?
There's a million reasons why the hardest thing in the world
is to have success and then sustain success.
And that is so hard. I'm going to ask you one thing
before we move on to some more like higher level things that we
love to talk about with our guests.
But something that we hear a lotabout from from our fans, from
(18:19):
parents, coaches is like, again,go back to that early experience
in whatever the sport is. And there's that boundary
between you want to have successso that you develop the love,
you develop the growth mindset. You want to continue to work at
it. No one wants to do something
that they're bad at. No one wants to show up every
day to practice and never get the results on the field.
(18:40):
But then there's the flip side. And I'm hearing you talk about
your early racing days and I'm it's starting my my light bulbs
going off. I'm saying there is an element
where too much early success is also a little bit of a hindrance
right now. You were racing older guys, you
were moving up the ladder. You weren't just racing other
your peers. So you were challenging yourself
and still finding early success.But just what would you say to
(19:04):
families with young athletes, drivers, sticking ball, whatever
the sport is like learning thoselessons at 12 instead of at 18
to 22 like the story you just told?
Would you have been more prepared to handle it at 1819 if
maybe you did have a little morebumps in the road when you were
young? I've been way tougher.
(19:25):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I was very cocky and
arrogant when I first showed up because I've never lost.
I mean, I had every reason to believe it.
Of course I'm the best. Like who's better?
Like I'm, I don't get beat. That's what I thought.
And I, I wish I had a little bitmore failure earlier in my
(19:46):
career, But I mean what? You can't change that.
No, but I, I mean to, to answer your question too about like
kids sports these days versus like we talked about how like I
was the advanced one doing all this stuff.
And now all the kids are doing this right, like racing a late
model full size car at 12 years old used to be like, are you
(20:08):
freaking crazy? Nobody does that.
Now there's 12 year old kids racing full size cars around the
country like it's normal. And I, as somebody that went
through that, now I look at a 12year old kid racing a late
model, I go and I think it's crazy.
And I, I think it's too much, like I think it's too soon now.
(20:29):
And it probably depends on the kid and it depends on the
parent. Because I think like for me, my
father and I had a blast. And like, that was the one thing
like my dad, I said, he did so many things right.
But the most important thing he always did with me was that we
made sure we had fun, like we enjoyed it.
Was there pressure around? Him to win.
(20:50):
There's always he never said it.He never like chewed me out if I
made a mistake. Like he was always supportive,
but he's an intense person. And you always, I mean, you
always want to win for your parents, right?
Like that's like a natural. Parent has their different
approach. Some are more subtle, some are a
little more outward about it. Yeah, I mean, he did more like
(21:11):
we're doing it together. Like we're kind of like a team.
Like it was like a partnership. We're doing it together.
He never said that, right? You're a kid, right?
But but looking back at it, that's how we did it.
Now I've seen lots of kids show up to the racetrack that it's
dad's dream. It's not, it's not the kids
dream and it happens in every sport.
It's dad's dream. Dad didn't make it, but I want
(21:34):
my kid to make it and they robbed their kids childhood from
it. Like I love driving cars to this
day, if I get 10 minutes to kill, I'm jumping on my four
Wheeler and I'm driving through the woods.
I love it. I absolutely love if I go to
racetrack to go testing, I'm going to run more laps than
anybody because I freaking love it.
And that's if that's not in you as a child that you absolutely
(22:00):
freaking love it and it's all you want to do.
Don't do it. Like do it.
If you want to do it, do it withthe intentions of learning key
lessons that are going to help you in life, right.
If your child does not absolutely eat, breathe, sleep
that sport, make sure it's fun #1 and make sure they learn some
(22:23):
lessons, right? Because there's so many lessons
to be learned in sports. Talk about one of them losing,
right? Learning to lose.
These days, a lot of kids have never experienced it, right?
They're coddled, right? Like they got to learn, like to
take those hits sometimes. I just think there's so many
lessons in sports, but you can'ttake the fun out of it because
you're only a kid once. And to me, they're my most
(22:45):
cherished memories. But I seen a lot of kids that I
grew up with where it was like, not that for them and their dad
would be chewing them out after a race and I'd be sitting there
like almost feeling bad for him.Like after you beat him, like
you're like, shit. Like I didn't realize that would
happen. Like it's just it's.
It happens in every I mean. It happens in baseball, it
happens in Little League. Anything like he just I hate.
(23:08):
That is the one thing I hate themost.
Like, and my son now, he's my oldest is 6, and he's kind of
showed a little bit of interest in racing, but he's a little bit
nervous to go out there and racewith the cars.
But even when we have gone out there, it's weird because we
show up and it's Joey Logano's kid, Hudson, not Hudson.
(23:29):
Like, I was Tom Logano's son, the garbage man from
Connecticut, right? Like they went like there was
no. Expectation.
This interview with Joey Logano is brought to you by our friends
at Players Health, a company providing solutions to protect
young athletes while playing thesports they love.
We sat down with their CEO, Tyree Burks to hear how Players
(23:51):
Health is making safer environments for athletes.
An incident specifically around emotional, physical, sexual
abuse within a youth athlete will change their life forever.
I always like to say that if players help, our focus is to
make sure that the transaction between an athlete and their
sports organization. We wanted to be positive.
It limits the likelihood that something that will change a
(24:11):
life forever from happening. We only want sports to be
positive. We can't get bigger than that.
For more information on players health, visit their website to
find out how they can help you. This interview is also brought
to you by Max UA Youth Sports training program focused on
unlocking your child's potentialthrough mindset development.
We spoke with the founders of Max U, Dan Greco and Brian
(24:33):
Kornfeld to learn how Max U is empowered young athletes.
How do you swing a baseball bat?How do you catch a football?
How do you shoot a basketball orswing a tennis racket?
Those are skills are being worked on all the time, but
these mental skills can truly matter so much.
More so by having a simple, easyto use tool that can get out to
the masses. We're just really, really
(24:54):
excited about what this can meanfor our mission and what it can
mean to honestly change a generation.
To learn more about Maxu, visit maxu.co and use Code Youth, Inc
24 for $10 off a yearly subscription.
Now back to our interview with Joey Logano.
I wasn't going to ask you about it right now, but since you
brought it up, how how do you how do you plan on handling if
he does stay in that racing world?
(25:15):
He's not going to shake it. And that was something when I
talked to Dale on. You think we talked to Dale.
I talked to Kyle Busch, whose son's doing it, Obviously Dale
when he was a kid growing up. Expectations are real, whether
it's fair, unfair, justified. There's going to be people
rooting against Hudson. There's going to be people who
love him because they love his dad.
You're going to get everything in between like and as you start
(25:36):
like processing that as he gets older, like, how do you guys
anticipate handling that? I, I think some of the like
going back to the lessons, losing when you're young, being
very important for you. Like there's a balance of
confidence versus learning, learning what life's all about.
And he's already showing up in the limelight.
(25:57):
I don't like that in the 1st place, but there's not much I
can do about it. But we're not going to show up
with the nicest car. He's going to work on his car.
He's going to like it's it's going to be an average car with
a few times we have gone and raced.
We showed up in the back of a pickup truck.
I said it's a freaking go Kart. What do I need?
I need something to change the tires.
I need a tool bag with like a few tools and an air pressure
(26:19):
gauge. Like I don't need much.
He's six years old. He can barely hold the thing
wide open all year on a racetrack.
Why do I need all this other stuff?
And you see other kids racing there and they got the logos,
tents, they got all the nice gear.
No, I'm like, if he doesn't clean his car, then he's going
to race a dirty car. That's on him.
Like, because I want him to learn those lessons when it
(26:40):
doesn't matter, because he's sixyears old, it doesn't matter.
Now is the time. Now is the time to do it. 17
It's a different animal. So if and he doesn't push me a
whole bunch to race, he just wants to drive his four Wheeler
every day out here with dad, I'mfine with that.
Perfect six years old. Like I'm not going to push you
to do it. If you want to do it, great.
If you want to. He wants to play basketball
right now. Cool, I can't help you in that,
(27:00):
but I'll be there to help. Like I'll do it whatever I can,
right. Like I'm not a basketball
player. I don't know what to do, but
it's so interesting. But that's fine, I think,
because I want those lessons to be learned more than anything
right now, because if he wins a race right now when he's 6, you
think that's going to help him make it?
It's. Relevant.
Never. In the big picture, it's
relevant. It doesn't matter.
We say that all the time now as kids are chasing the baseball
(27:22):
world and volleyball and basketball.
And I say, I promise you, no college coach is ever going to
walk in and say, can you pull uphow many tournaments he won at
12 years old? Show me what team he was on.
I promise you, no one's asking what your record was at 12 U
baseball, 12 U volleyball. It's not worth spending the
money yet. It's just too young.
It's not worth spending the timeto do all that.
(27:42):
It's worth him learning the lessons right now.
A couple other things before I let you go.
Obviously racing looks like an individual sport.
It's the car, the driver, but itis a I've been on, I've been in
pit row. I've been down to the tracks for
the All Star race and the Coca-Cola fight, like all the
big races, Like there is a lot of team element to this.
Like all right, I want to be on Joey Logano, top driver, cup
(28:07):
series champ, top of the top, the non negotiables for you.
You want to be on my team, whether it's the pit crew or the
tire changer or the guy that theJackman, whatever it is like as
you put your team together like,what are those qualities of an
individual sport that has to operate in a team setting in
order to build garages of trophies?
(28:29):
Right. And so to answer that, you're
going to take a step back a little bit, right?
So the driver is like the quarterback of the team, like
he's the Jazz. Man face.
Sure, sure. That's actually, you're kind of
right. I'm just kidding.
So like it's and the the crew chief is like the coach and then
there's the owner that and like everybody's got to make their
(28:51):
decisions on who's on the team. But then there's also day-to-day
people that are that are helpingto run all this stuff.
And so it's it's not just on me.I'm just part of the team.
I'm a leader of the team, but the number one thing to me is
ownership. You got it.
Like take ownership in yourself,in your actions.
(29:13):
That's the number one thing. You, you, I'd rather some, you
got to look inward first before you start pointing fingers.
And I'm, I'm the same way. Like that's, that's something
that I do all the time because I'm, I'm going to be the one to
kick myself before anybody else does.
No one's going to tell me something that I haven't already
thought about about myself at least, because I'm you're
(29:34):
naturally hard on yourself, or at least I am.
No, no. But I want other people to be
the same way. I don't want someone to make
excuses to say it's always because of this or because of
that. Like, no, like could you have
controlled that? Could you have controlled that?
Like the number one thing that Ican't stand, a lot of times,
it's like when we go to superspeedways in Daytona,
Talladega, you know, a lot of people say it's luck.
(29:55):
And so you just got in the rightplace at the right time and it's
just lucky and you just didn't get in the right.
No, because there's a lot of decisions made that put you in
that spot way before that might be 40 laps ago, might been in
the garage before he even started the the weekend that put
you in that spot. I don't believe in luck.
There's zero luck involved in insports in my mind.
(30:17):
A lot of them are just decisions.
And you have to be willing to take ownership and look far
enough back on why that happened.
And my team does a fantastic jobat that.
Paul Wolf, my crew chief. I mean, there ain't nobody that
shows a better example of that than Paul.
But but that's what we are like that we're kind of an old school
race team from that perspective.And yeah, that's that to me is
(30:40):
the number one thing that you got to have on a race team.
How about the mental approach before the race, during the
week? Like it seems like a sport that
requires so much mental toughness, focus.
I mean, you're, you're your brain.
You are being stimulated and occupied to your to your point,
making decisions in real time reaction.
(31:01):
Like, is there anything you do, anything throughout the racing
world that you know drivers do? Like the mental side, I think is
such an ignored component to just sports in general and.
So much of it, right? So, and, and to me it's more
important like you work on your skills, you're hitting, you're
throwing, you're running, you'rejumping, but like very few
people work on their, their mental approach, routine, focus.
(31:23):
Like, are there things in the racing world that you do, other
guys do that you feel like have allowed you to separate
yourself, prepare yourself? Yeah, I think that being able to
handle pressure is the most important thing, right.
And I look at our race team or myself even like we show up in
the playoffs way more than we doall year long.
Our regular season, even this year, our regular season wasn't
(31:45):
nothing to be be happy about, but our playoffs were fantastic.
And it's happened like that all three times and, and, and other
times throughout the year, like it's just high pressure moments
is when we show up. It's not an accident that it's
like that. Some people are are born to love
that pressure. Some people have to learn to
(32:06):
love the pressure and it's nevercomfortable, right?
It's not like you like feel comfort and pressure.
But for me, I find ways to back myself up against the wall
because and find a way to dig out of it because that's just
makes me better, right? I'm better off going out there
and calling, calling my hit before it happens to put that
(32:30):
pressure on me because it just makes me work harder and be more
prepared and all those type of things.
So like for me, I know I'm not the fastest race car driver on
the racetrack. I know that I try to be and I
try to work on that craft all the time.
But I also know where my strengths are and I think I'm
the most mental tough race car driver on the racetrack.
(32:50):
And that's why I think where it's late race restarts or it's
racing for a championship in thefinal four, it's going to be
really hard to beat us because of that.
That's our strength. So we play that.
And and how do I feel more prepared than anyone?
Well, one, I've been doing it for a long time.
That always helps. But two, I'm going to out
prepare my over any other driver.
(33:11):
I'm going to know what's going on.
There should be no surprises, inother words, of what's going to
happen in this race. I should be fully prepared for
it. And when I feel fully prepared,
it's comes natural after that, like I don't do the pressure,
the the stress that you feel comes down a lot and you can
focus in way better. It's just all about the prep.
(33:34):
It's all about the little crap that you don't think matters and
you may never see in the race, but at least there's not going
to be a surprise when it does happen all.
Right, last question. So all that being said, you win
the 24 Cup series, great playoffrun.
Give me one example. Give me one critical moment why
you were at your best when it mattered and that was all the
(33:57):
difference. Is there one thing off the top
of your head, a decision? You mentioned late start, you
know, late race restart. Like is there anything that
comes to mind that's like a great kind of bow to tie around
like everything you just laid out preparation both before the
race, during mental toughness, adversity.
Is there like one thing that pops into mind is like this?
Is all of it playing out in a real moment?
(34:19):
Yeah, I guess it's so hard to say as one because it takes so
much to get to it and there's somany people that lead up to.
But you're asking me personally,the final restart of the
championship race in Phoenix, 50something laps to go, we
restarted 5th. And before you get to a restart,
you get to choose what line you're in, right?
(34:40):
So you have to study which lane is the best lane to be in, but
also where's your competitors? And the way it lined up is the
24. Byron, he was the leader, he
picked the bottom, but he had two of his teammates right
there. And so the the five and the 9,
we're on a 2 outside lanes and then there's a 20 in front of me
and then me 5th. And so I thought, shoot, 24 is
(35:01):
in a really good place here. The teammates are going to kind
of let them up. They're not racing for a
championship. He should be fine.
The pressure got to him. He missed Turn 1.
We went up the racetrack, let the 20 get underneath them.
All I did is stay calm through the situation.
Right now, the 20s up next to them, the 20 makes a mistake
racing for the lead and slides up the racetrack.
It just opens the door for me. So like the point was the whole
(35:22):
the whole time as I was fully prepared for what can happen and
I stayed calm and they didn't and opened up the door for us to
take the championship. And it came down to two mistakes
on those guys and we were able to be perfect through that
restart and then holding off my teammate Blaney, who ran me down
at the end of the race, but ableto hold them off.
(35:43):
It was is intense and awesome, but it all just happened because
of the prep. That was really all that
happened. Well dude, I can't tell you man
to to, to be able to pick the brain of high performers, people
that are used to operating in critical moments, intense
moments, and not just have periodic success.
I I agree with you about the element of luck.
(36:03):
Like there is nothing lucky about people that can repeat
success over and over and over extended periods of time against
the best in the world, against people that's only job is to
unseat you and to get next year's trophy.
So to like, again, in a world that I don't pretend to know,
but I believe all these practices, whether it's racing,
(36:24):
football, business, these practices of high achievers, all
the principles align. They're all the same.
It's just how you apply it to whatever field you're in.
So for you to kind of share thismindset, share your back story
and your history of why you are who you are and have had the
success. I think it's going to be very,
very appealing and interesting to our to our viewers on you
(36:45):
think man. So appreciate you taking a
couple minutes to Share your story.
Absolutely. Great compliments when
somebody's done well, even more than me.
So I appreciate it. So thank you.
Appreciate you man, this was awesome.
Popular Podcasts
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Law & Order: Criminal Justice System - Season 1 & Season 2
Season Two Out Now! Law & Order: Criminal Justice System tells the real stories behind the landmark cases that have shaped how the most dangerous and influential criminals in America are prosecuted. In its second season, the series tackles the threat of terrorism in the United States. From the rise of extremist political groups in the 60s to domestic lone wolves in the modern day, we explore how organizations like the FBI and Joint Terrorism Take Force have evolved to fight back against a multitude of terrorist threats.